THEATER - "Walk the Mountain"

Walk the Mountain, Jude Narita’s one-woman show about the effects of war on Vietnamese women, is a dull and encyclopedic restatement of facts. Occasionally, Narita finds some poetry and passion, but for the majority of the time, her characters are lifelessly matter-of-fact. Between scenes, a slideshow splatters horrific (and obligatory) images of war, along with the now-clichéd quotes of men like Ho Chi Minh; this scenery is more alive than the show.

Walk the Mountain never finds a way to excite the audience: most of the text is dry and factual, and presented as such. Too many of Narita’s characters are repressed, which creates a dulling inaction on stage, no matter how horrible the effects of Agent Orange and napalm are (“Destiny”). Words are just words here, and because they never seem to hurt Narita’s characters, they never hurt us, either. Children fall from the sky, she explains in the short vignette “For the Children,” and audience members, twice removed, don’t care. Narita shakes incense in “Prayer for Three Sons” until she is worked up enough to mourn her dead sons, charred somewhere in the infinite jungle, and then quickly scurries off, as if she is embarrassed to hold us in the moment. Her scenes are more fragments than pieces, and they spend so much time getting to the point that by the time each ends, we remember only the faintest semblance of grief.

Narita seems uncomfortable with her own show. She trips over words a lot, and her inflections are troublesome, too. The accent she affects may be genuine, but the way she pauses mid-sentence makes her seem like a Vietnamese William Shatner. Thankfully, by the final two scenes, Narita recomposes herself, and both “Dream Mountain” and “Long Journey” are examples of how potent this play might be. These characters, both so alive, remind the audience of how dead so many others who suffered in Vietnam are.

The effect of war on women (or vice-versa) is often overlooked, but all Walk the Mountain manages is to under-look at history, across an emotionally barren gulf.

THEATER - "The Lieutenant of Inishmore"

Bottom line for all the blokes: "The Lieutenant of Inishmore" is feckin’ stupid. For those who didn't already know, violence--at least according to the playwright, Martin McDonagh--is pretty stupid. For everyone else, "The Lieutenant of Inishmore" is pretty stupid, a play that has buckets of blood to its name and nothing else (although, to its credit, it has many, many gallons worth).

There are better bloody farces, (like "The Revenger's Tragedy") and stronger sanguine satires (like McDonagh's own "The Pillowman"). "The Lieutenant of Inishmore," once it has exhausted a rather restrained mockery of an alternately titled "cat-braining" Irish terrorist organization, has nowhere to go but down, and it does--comedy for the lowest common denominator. The performances are decent, but the characters have few reversals, are all fairly bloodless, and are ultimately overwhelmed by the inevitable whirlwind of death (read: an all too-long climax).

The premise itself isn't half-bad: Padraic (David Wilmot) is both a terrorist and a lunatic (McDonagh suggests that to be one, is to be the other), and he threatens to become grossly unhinged after his only friend dies. His father, Donny (Peter Gerety) quickly realizes that the only way to save his life, and that of Davey (Domhnall Gleeson), the innocent bystander who found the body, is to cover up the death of poor Wee Thomas, who is, by the way, a cat.

There's a great friendship of circumstance (think Laurel and Hardy) in the works here, and for all the crude cursing and dark humor, there are some very fine, bright moments. Somewhere during the intermission (and periodically before that), all that delightful sin is corrupted, and what returns to the stage for the second act is nothing more than a one-dimensional feat of stagecraft. The cartoon violence that follows--enough blood on the floor to be a slip-'n'-slide--is just laughter for shock's sake. We erudite theatergoers laugh because we, of course, would never be so boorish, so ill-mannered.

“Lieutenant of Inishmore" made me sick: not from the violence (though it's not for the queasy) but from feeling so cheated. All the superficial jokes and killer sight gags (if you consider decapitated body parts a sight gag) make for an ultimately empty show. This play, like many of the characters, becomes a bloody mess. With all the winking asides and coy jokes to the audience that this is all just a bit too much (and ultimately, all for naught) I think McDonagh knows this, too. “The Lieutenant of Inishmore” serves only as a momentary catharsis, and once the lights go up, it will leave you cold as a corpse.

THEATER - "The Cataract"

For a stylized drama, “The Cataract” is mostly down to earth. Save for some metaphor running rampant in Act II, this play about the deep and mysterious bond between people is a fecund production that stretches the minimalism of both the stage and language to its most affecting high.

“The Cataract” is the story of two families in Minnesota, circa the late 19th century, who have come together through the necessity of circumstance. Dan and Dinah are free-spirited travelers from the South, come to board with the puritanical Cyrus and Lottie. Lottie is unhappy with having to share their home with these “commoners” (especially Dinah, who may very well be the first Hippie), whereas Cyrus seems thrilled by Dan’s electric energy, and for his assistance on the bridge that he is helping to build across the Mississippi. As it turns out, the explanation for all this unrest is simple: both Cyrus and Lottie love Dan, and no matter how they cling to routine, they can’t escape the constant hammering of their thoughts. Katie Pearl, the director, and Lisa D’Amour, the author, have found a perfect expression for this in the sequential storytelling: every “day” begins with a cock’s crow and then layers scenes atop one another as the day wends through breakfast, work, and dinner, culminating in an often-revelatory dream sequence.

[Read on] at New Theater Corps

THEATER - "Mercy on the Doorstep"

Dispense with stereotype, and make with the realism! Gip Hoppe’s “Mercy on the Doorstep” mixes gentle storytelling and harsh reality to make for a compelling and vibrant drama, the first in many years to allow "fair and balanced" to be seen with "religious." Sure, the first glimpse of Rena and Mark screams out “bible thumper,” but Hoppe spends the rest of the show dispelling these initial perceptions, all while avoiding any one proselytizing view. It’s a neat trick, deftly executed by three marvelous performers and one very experienced director.

[Read on] at New Theater Corps

FILM - "V for Vendetta"

V for Vendetta oozes preposterousness, more so than the original comic, but that doesn't make it any less entertaining. V is so entertaining, in fact, that one quickly forgets he's a terrorist . . . or perhaps the film reminds us that terrorism is not quite as black and white as we believe. Then again, there's never been such a charming terrorist: this Don Juan with a vengeance, this symbolic Guy Fawkes revolutionary (he's got the mask to prove it!), this alliterative-speaking, Shakespeare-quoting, domino-playing, and classical-music loving character is an adorable anti-hero. And as Hugo Weaving plays him, with a sly and graceful wit, he's all the more charming: a prince among terrorists, the gentleman bomber.

[Read on] at Film Monthly

THEATER - "Not Clown"

Tomfoolery is back, and if you don’t like it, it will cut your throat. Last year, “The Pillowman” separated fantasy from reality; now “Not Clown” adds a red nose to it. There’s physical comedy, a twisted homage to classic clowning, and some bona fide acting, too. Just one warning: if you weren’t frightened of clowns before, you might be now. This allegorical play (substitute clowns for any mistreated and misunderstood race) puts the laughter back in slaughter.

[Read on] at New Theater Corps

THEATER - "Baby Girl"

Life is just a matter of perception: no better or worse than what we make of it. “Baby Girl,” a new play by Edith Freni, is just a matter of life, a young single mother’s, but it is far better than what we initially make of it. Don’t get thrown by the convoluted plot—it’s a necessity to throw our perceptions for a loop. What we see isn’t necessarily reality—the protagonist is far from reliable, and trust is a huge issue in this play—but the emotional truth beneath the gritty surface sucks the audience in like quicksand, and the swift pacing, urban soundtrack, forceful acting, and realist direction by Padraic Lillis keeps us there.

[Read on] at New Theater Corps

THEATER - "Savages"

Who exactly are the savages in Anne Nelson’s new play, “Savages”? Nelson doesn’t answer this question in her somewhat fact-based account of the Philippines-American War (1899-1914) because she doesn’t know. Instead, she lets her lively text ramble, with the hope that intelligent discussion will stumble over subconscious truth. It doesn’t. It just rambles.

[Read on] at New Theater Corps

THEATER - "Phenomenon"

The day before Mt. St. Helens erupts, a reporter, a waiter, a geologist, a wannabe punk, and a guitar-slinging cowboy meet, briefly, in a diner. Then, with cinematic grace and occasionally to a live choral score, they separate and have brief and momentary encounters that are somehow more than the sum of their parts. Oh, and the volcano is represented by a dancer who tap-dances tremors and performs a molten modern dance.

[Read on] at New Theater Corps

THEATER - "Hard Right"

Hard Right is like a horrible car crash. You don’t want to keep watching, but you can’t take your eyes away. The entire play, all seventy minutes of it, may be nothing more than a log-flume ride of violence, verbal and physical, but it’s oddly compelling, too: an entertaining, satirical, nightmarish “what-if” on just how close our government may be to totalitarianism. Unfortunately, David Barth, the playwright, is all statement and very little substance: the whole show is trigger-happy for effect, and therefore a one-sided, one-dimensional, sloppy wreck. I can’t stop watching.

[Read on] at New Theater Corps

MUSIC - Magnet, "The Torniquet"

Music and marriage are pretty much the only places where opposites can merge, find harmony, and become something greater than their separate parts. Today, many people are finding that they can go at it better alone, and they've got a distinct sound too. Even Johansen, better known as Magnet, comes replete with his bipolar north and south, and, thanks to the miracles of studio production, is pretty good backing himself up.

[Read on] at Silent Uproar

THEATER - "Defiance"

It’s hard to say playwright John Patrick Shanley’s newest play, Defiance, has a crystal-clear point. This show, about two military officers confronting issues of race and loyalty, spreads itself across so many aspects of 1970s Americana that at times the whip-smart writing and spot-on actors are the only things holding the plot together. Despite that, it’s even harder to find anything negative to say about Defiance itself.

[Read on] at Show Business Weekly

MUSIC - Devics, "Push The Heart"

You go your whole life without tasting the real thing, fooled by the saccharine preservatives or the fancy packaging, and then one day, if you’re lucky, you bite into the real thing. I’m not suggesting that you run out and become a vegan, but there’s something to be said for the Devics’ organic, homebrewed sound. Push the Heart is better without modulation and auditory slight-of-hand. And while it might not be rock rock (slow, elegant, and drum-less as it is), it’s music music: Pure and with no strings (save the guitar’s and your heart’s) attached.

[Read on] at Silent Uproar

FILM - Funny Money

Trying to write a summary of a good farce can easily take over a thousand words. Thing is, Funny Money is a good farce. And I don't have a thousand words. So here's the plot: risk-averse wax fruit salesman ("odd"-jective, wacky job) accidentally switches briefcases with a Russian Mafioso (affectionately called Mr. Nasty) and winds up with $5,000,000. A food-obsessed corrupt cop (see the pattern?) shows up to blackmail the salesman, whom he believes was soliciting sexual favors in a bathroom. See how complicated it's getting? Folks, we haven't even reached the end of Act I.

[Read on] at Film Monthly

FILM - London

People break up all the time. However, they don’t usually sniff cocaine off Van Gogh paintings in an upscale New York loft while speaking the most intellectually dense dialogue this side of “Dawson’s Creek.” They do in “London,” which, despite trying to be a very realistic and grittily shot film, winds up looking more like an urban fantasy than anything plausible or remotely emotional.

Syd, played a little too well by Chris Evans, is trying to woo back London, played by Jessica Biel, although her body double could’ve handled the “acting.” His plan involves going, uninvited, to her going-away party and holing up in a bathroom, shooting coke and getting philosophical with Bateman, a friend-of-a-friend and his supplier. Jason Statham, who plays Bateman, goes way over the top, but he’s still so suave and cool that he makes it work. Syd’s plan, on the other hand, works about as well as the movie: poorly. If writer/director Hunter Richards wanted to make a philosophical film like “Waking Life,” he should’ve stayed away from the coke himself.

If you get rid of the hokey romance-gone-bad plot, there are some great scenes in the bathroom, most of which use snappy flashbacks and a few quirky camera angles to relate humorous anecdotes. That’s right: the anecdotal asides are more cinematically impressive and memorable than the plot itself. “London” is such a pretentious thinking film that the visual aids, funny on their own, help the mind’s medicine go down. Of course, none of that helps to alleviate the bigger symptom: all the preachy overtones. Yes, “I’d rather regret something I have done than something I was too scared to do,” is a great line; when characters keep rephrasing it, it becomes as cheesy as a catchphrase. That may work for the way in which Hunter Richards neatly resolves his plot, an inconclusively solid “Lost in Translation”-type affair, but it just makes “London” into an artsy, angst-y breakup film. If that’s what you’re into—stick with cocaine and stare at a wall; that’s liable to have an equal effect.